1

When I copy text from another program to Excel, it does not preserve the properties of the text, such as being bold or italic. It pastes it as a plain text. Is there any way to save the text to Excel with these features, whether bold or italic?

screenshot

Improve this question

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
0

Excel seems very limited regarding the clipboard formats that it accepts. If the program that does the copy does it without putting the text on the clipboard in a format that it understands, Excel will just paste the pure text without the formatting.

Here is an example where the format is lost : Select some formatted text in Word, copy and paste into Wordpad and see that the format is still correct. Now select the text in Wordpad and copy-paste to Excel. The formatting will now be lost.

A workaround that I found to keep the formatting is :

  1. Paste the copied text into Word - this will keep the format
  2. Select and copy the text again, but from inside Word
  3. Paste the text into Excel.

Word seems to be more flexible about the formats that it accepts, and it also copies the text and its format into the clipboard in a format that Excel can understand.

Improve this answer
3
  • I remember trying that before, man. But it's a long way. I will do it for hundreds, thousands of words in a very long process. That would consume my time. Thank you. Excel needs to be able to copy proper formatting too.
    – timucin pusat
    Commented Nov 30, 2023 at 6:14
  • You need to set the source application to generate a format that Excel understands. Otherwise, you may signal the problem to Microsoft on the Feedback Hub, but we users can't change Excel.
    – harrymc
    Commented Nov 30, 2023 at 10:21
  • no need. thank you.
    – timucin pusat
    Commented Dec 11, 2023 at 0:06

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .